Gecko123

He was referring to Congressman Adam Schiff, the former chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, who showed great leadership and courage during the Trump impeachment hearings and who will soon be the next Senator from the great state of California, and who I am proud to say I voted for in the primary election, and will do so again in the November general election.

Russian troll/bot. alert.

Hello? The Ukraine war started because Russia invaded Ukraine. If you're suggesting that Russia wouldn't have invaded Ukraine if Trump had been in the White House, you're kidding yourself. Trump would likely have acquiesced to Putin's expansionist ambitions, further emboldening him to expand further, making the likelihood of a wider conflict far greater.

If you look at Hillary Clinton's character, intelligence, and depth of experience, to this day she stands head and shoulders over Trump. America would have been infinitely better off had she been elected in 2016, and it's an American tragedy that she wasn't.

crazy like a fox

The Plaza accord, mentioned in the Politico article as a possible template for what Trump's policies would be, was designed to weaken the US dollar so as to make US exports more competitive in Japan. Japan artificially suppressed its interest rates in the process, causing all the capital that Japan was earning from its exports to go into the Japanese real estate and stock markets (because bond and savings yields were so unattractive) and created a huge bubble which burst in the early 1990's resulting in decades of deflation which Japan still hasn't fully recovered from. It's doubtful that after that fiasco, there are many countries out there who would enter into such a scheme with the US again.

I suspect the dollar's headed lower after the elections no matter who is elected. Inflation is going to remain "sticky" for the forseeable future, which is going to tie the Fed's hands in terms of lowering rates. I don't expect any rate cuts between now and the election. The main drivers behind the inflation are deficit spending which is pumping trillions of "extra" dollars into the economy, as well as climate change which is driving food prices higher. Every indication is that under this "higher for longer" scenario, something is going to "break". My guess is that it will most likely be the banking system that is struggling to retain deposits, is sitting on trillions of unrealized paper losses on their bond portfolios, and is facing a looming risk of commercial property loan defaults due to reduced demand and valuations for office and retail properties due to remote working and on line shopping. Other likely potential "breaking" points could come in the housing market due to high mortgage rates cutting into demand or a drop in the stock market as investors realize that interest rates are going to remain high. When that breaking point comes, the Fed is probably going to slash interest rates and when it does, the dollar is going to crater like we haven't seen in a long time. Were Trump to respond to the next financial crisis by slashing taxes (probably mostly for the rich) or engaging in additional rounds of fiscal stimulus which would further balloon the Federal debt, this would greatly amplify the negative impact on the dollar. As far as I can determine, the outlook for the US dollar going forward is poor. The occupant of the White House will have a huge impact on who will likely suffer the most as a result of the devaluation, but I don't see (m)any magic bullets to make this structural problem disappear.

It was triggered by early posts on the thread suggesting that the deceased farmer deserved little sympathy. Presumably some of these comments were made by expats living in areas where smog from agricultural burning is at its worst. While I can empathize with their frustration with poor air quality, I found the suggestion that the farmer deserved what happened to him to be offensive. Rice farmers have some of the lowest incomes in the agricultural sector. The man was elderly, as are many of the members on this forum. You would think more empathy would be shown towards a fellow senior citizen, and the disrespect for his humanity, in my opinion, bordered on racism. I live in a small farming community - not much rice is grown here - but many of the farmers are elderly, and something like a farmer getting caught and dying in a field fire would have had a traumatizing effect on the whole community. Everyone is assuming that what he was doing was illegal in his area, but it's not clear that this was the case. The news article references another instance of illegal agricultural burning getting out of hand and resulting in damage to structures elsewhere in Thailand , but burning ordinances are not universal in Thailand, and the article did not say that this particular farmer was breaking the law by burning the field. The burning of rice stubble produces a tiny fraction of the smoke generated that a field of burning sugar cane produces. Even if a thresher came in and just harvested the rice grains leaving the stalks in place, the amount of smoke wouldn't be that extensive. At most, the stalks would be knee high, unlikely to cause a conflagration which the farmer couldn't escape from, which is probably why the police and his family are speculating that he had a medical emergency. I would also like to add that from personal experience I can attest that it is not that difficult to misjudge wind speed and direction when burning. As I said in an earlier post, an indigent rice farmer in all probability has a fraction of the carbon footprint of the typical expat retiree zooming around in a gas guzzling SUV, sitting in air conditioned comfort in his house, leading a consumer oriented lifestyle, enjoying international and domestic travel and ordering stuff on-line. For someone leading such a lifestyle, when that lifestyle is made possible or at least subsidized in large part by the exploitation of local labor such as the deceased farmer's to ignore this truth and to also overlook their own contribution to air quality and environmental degradation was more than I could stomach.

Air quality. That's your issue. Got it. Let's talk about your impact on air quality, shall we? How many miles did you drive last year? How many air miles did you travel? How much electricity did you use last year? What is the thermostat on your air conditioner set at? How much trash did you generate? How much did you order from overseas? How much plastic trash and air freight carbon emissions did it generate? How did you dispose of that trash? Did you burn it? Do you recycle? Etc., etc., etc. My point is that if you compared all the CO2 this farmer's activities and lifestyle generated over the course of a year, it would probably be less than yours. He probably didn't have air conditioning, drive an SUV, take international trips, order much stuff on line, use the internet or buy Bitcoin (all of which use a lot of energy), or generate a fraction of the garbage you do. Still don't get my point? I'm saying look in the mirror.

Appreciate the explanation of your perspective.

Would be interesting to compare this farmer's carbon footprint to your carbon footprint. That goes for all the other Little Cesars on this thread as well.

Have to tell you SB, I am rather surprised by your flippant remarks on this thread. Perhaps I am misrecollecting, but didn't you write a while back about listening to early morning chanting coming from different temples during your early morning walks? It's an experience I've shared, and I attributed a certain sensitivity to you as a result. Would like to think I wasn't wrong in this assessment, but as I take another glance, your member name is spelled soalbundy, not soulbundy, so maybe I was just projecting. Do you not live in a community with elderly farmers? Is it that difficult to imagine a neighbor of yours meeting this terrible fate?

Fine. Let's make respiratory health, especially for the ALL-important expat community, the #1 top priority. All in favor of this, 100%. Food prices will go up for sure, but no doubt you as an expat can absorb the added costs. All I'm saying is don't demonize the lowly farmer for trying to eke out a living the best way he can. The real culprit is agro-businesses competing with one another to satisfy consumer demand (including you) who wants low prices, and don't care about hidden intangible costs like air pollution unless they are directly affected by the problem. Clean air, fair prices for farmers, and making consumers pay for the hidden environmental costs of food production. I'm all for it!!!

You make it sound like he was a pyromaniac. You're obviously clueless about why rice fields are burned after a harvest. Yes, the practice has been banned in some areas, and yes, it contributes to air pollution and climate change, but the reason why farmers continue to do this is because of its a cost effective way to clear crop residue, and in many cases, the market price doesn't compensate the farmer for the added cost to dispose of the debris in a more environmentally friendly way.

Some of the comments on this thread are unbelievable. You guys can't muster any more empathy for an elderly impoverished farmer who lost his life producing the food you eat? Sad.

Take a class in statistics for God's sake.

Despite all the MAGA bravado that the outcome of the trials aren't important, with the start of Trump's first trial, I think the prospect of potentially voting for a convicted felon, both in terms of what it will say about their moral core as well as how it would reflect poorly on the nation as a whole, is finally starting to sink in and sober people up.

Cops should be commended for promptly arresting the culprits. In the third clip in the OP there's footage of one cop talking to the culprits. He's got this big grin on his face which I found to be a little disconcerting. Little bit reminded me of 1960's civil rights era footage of a southern sheriff laughing and scratching with Klansmen under arrest for murdering Northern civil rights workers. Also noticed most of the people sitting in the back of the pickup were the girlfriends/wives of the assailants. Looks like a wolf pack mentality set in with no one wanting to be seen as unmanly in front of the women folk.

My point of reference for the following comments is rural/small/medium sized towns in Thailand. I question whether this is based on superficial observations. I think we've exchanged perceptions on this issue on other threads in the past. Playful overtures of 'I want a pua farang' , 'I have a friend who wants a pua farang', 'help me find a pua farang' are often just idle banter from vendors looking to amuse themselves to see if you'll take the bait; with their husbands lolling away within easy earshot in a hammock in the background. Many of the women you imagine are "available", actually have husbands who work away from home as truck drivers, construction, factory workers, sometimes for years and years at a time. This observation does not track with what I have observed. The vast majority of Thai men in my area seem to remain married to the woman who is the mother of his children. Most Thai men, unless they are considerably wealthy or have playboy good looks are keenly aware that they will probably have difficulty starting a second family with a new woman. There is also often a very strong financial incentive to remain in the marriage if his livelihood is connected to the marriage, i.e., the husband and wife work as a team in business or if the farm land is owned by the wife. For example, in a husband and wife pork vendor team the husband travels to the wholesale market to buy the pork carcasses and the wife handles the retail sales end of the business. Many retail sales operations are husband and wife (mom and pop) operations which would not survive or be severely impaired if a divorce were to occur. I can cite numerous examples of men in their late 20's - early to mid 30's hooking up with older Thai women in their early to mid 40's. Can also cite several examples of Thai men who appear to me to be more physically attractive than their Thai female spouse, with the incentive being that the wife has ownership, access to, or will likely inherit farm land and other assets. Not going to get into a fruitless debate about how well Thai women age, except to say that some do age well, while many do not. Farm work with exposure to sun, herbicides and pesticides, can be very aging. Access to medical and dental care is quite limited in rural Thailand. If a woman manages to avoid field work (which is a status symbol) she most often will find ways to supplement family income by opening a small grocery store or restaurant, both of which require long hours of fairly sedentary presence which also tends to contribute to premature aging. In general, I would not be in agreement with the assessment that Thai women age particularly well in rural/small town Thailand.

Whenever I see posts like this I roll my eyes and have to wonder when the last time the person was in Thailand. A lot has changed in the last 20 years. 1. Thailand's population has significantly aged. 2. Attitudes towards May-December relationships with older foreign men have changed. (Have you forgotten Prayut's infamous <<Are you not ashamed???>> speech in reference to Thailand's reputation as a sex tourism destination?) 3. Many ex-pats are barely hanging on with measly pensions and reduced purchasing power due to deteriorating exchange rates which has greatly diminishes their financial attractiveness. (Yes, I know the baht is currently very weak), 4. Social media and the internet has injected a great deal of sobering reality into the fantasy of hooking up with a foreigner and living happily ever after overseas. 5. Foreign men are no where near as gullible as they were 20 years ago, so the amount of effort a girl has to put into snaring a mark has greatly increased, and many no longer see it worth the effort it takes. 6. Many Thai men are struggling to find Thai women to form a household with. There is also greater competition from Asian men (Chinese/Korean/etc.) looking for marriage partners. I would venture to say that if your goal is to find a significantly younger sexually attractive woman who fits a "girl next door" mold who "loves you for you and not just for the financial security you might offer", that the difficulty of finding this in Thailand ---wait for it --- is almost as difficult as it is back home. And when you factor in the cultural and language barriers which make reading the tea leaves more difficult, a strong case can be made that the odds of success are lower here than back home.

My suspicion is the OP is misreading nervous giggly laughter at his goofy antics as her being receptive to going out on a date. OK, OK, call me Mr. Negative, but here's why I'm a little skeptical. The woman is probably working 6 days a week, meaning scheduling dates isn't going to be a walk in the park. Also if she's working there's a good chance she's either married, been married, or has kids she has to support. Young kids are going to further eat into her free time. Chances are the entire staff in whatever department she works in, if not the entire store, is going to hear about your romantic overture, and if you actually go out on a date, how it went down, so every time you go back to buy an extension cord be prepared for the knowing looks, and being pointed at and whispered about. If both she and you live near her place of employment, then there's the scuttlebutt issue about her being perceived as skanking around with an older foreign guy, basically getting accused of turning tricks. Should also mention that I've encountered a few "pros" (not prostitutes) working in retail stores. Women who have made it a regular side hustle dating customers. Fees to compensate her for time off from work, baby sitting fees, maybe chaperone fees for someone to accompany her on the first date or two, followed up by dinner at the most expensive restaurant in town, the evening ending with a peck on the cheek and a declination to go out on a second date due to lack of time away from work. Rinse and repeat. I'll admit I've seen some pretty cute girls working in hardware stores. Not sure if all of them have particularly scintillating personalities, but some are quite cute and seem down to earth. By all means give it a shot, but take it slow.

Thank you for providing this clarification over who has jurisdiction over the case. I was not aware of this. I would still say Anutin should refrain from his "forgone conclusion" and "not on my watch" remarks. There seems to be a lot of murky details about what exactly happened (was the doctor actually kicked), the credibility of witnesses, etc., which local officials are in a much better position to evaluate than Anutin, sitting in Bangkok would be. My criticism thus shifts from "undermining the judiciary" to "micro managing his subordinates" and "grandstanding for political gain" at the possible expense of fairness and even handed administration of immigration law.

This is true, but once the visa revocation was appealed to the courts, the final decision rests in the hands of the judicial system which is independent of the Department of the Interior. At least that's my understanding of how it's supposed to work.

Shouldn't this just be left up to the courts? Anutin weighing in on this legal proceeding before it has concluded is akin to Nixon opining on Charlie Manson's guilt half-way through the Tate-LaBianca murder trial. More restraint and respect for the judiciary's independence from politicians would also help instill greater confidence in the public, both here and abroad, that the final decision on this high profile case was made fairly and impartially.

The root cause of such incidents are usually incontinence, excessive inebriation, mental illness, or perhaps an inability to ask where the nearest bathroom is. Fail to see the point in subjecting people who suffer such an episode to public scorn. It's not like plastering these stories all over social media serves as a deterrent. When you have to go, you have to go.